By their fruits we have known them: propaganda, and
myth. But what are they? The definitions of both will for the sake of
debate reflect a black-and-white understanding with each at opposite polar ends
of a continuum that we might label, “helpful versus unhelpful stories,” or
“truly human stories vs. truly inhuman stories.” The extremely strong implication would be
that myth, in its ideal sense, would be as nourishing culturally and spiritually
as it is practical, whereas propaganda, as here defined, would be ultimately a
deadening exercise in manipulation to the short-term advantage of a relative
few.
That propaganda is a life sappping tool is not to
imply at all that it would, as a necessary consequence of this vampiric quality,
be powerless to motivate large numbers of people, for propaganda has
successfully motivated huge numbers of people to their detriment, and may yet accompany
us to our doom. The implication of the
word “propaganda” is indeed that it is noxious in the long term, even if it
succeeds in swaying the will of entire populations. The overtones of the word “myth,” then, are,
naturally, highly beneficial for the overall community, even if it fails to
sway even the majority (in this case, keeping in mind the global consequences
of many of the actions of our currently overswollen population of 7 billion
souls, I will take the point of view that the “community” now means all of us—all other species, and the resources they depend upon—included).
The above having been clarified, it would also make
sense to delineate the similarities between the two media of
communication. Both can be intensely
powerful, both have been present, most likely, since the beginning of story
telling in our hominid line—whenever that was.
Myths always use archetypes, idiosycratic constellations of the
different parts of our humanity, and of our world as we see it, instinctively
recognizable to all on some level.
Propaganda often uses (here I must say exploits) the archetypes as well, in an effort to hook us on a
deeper level into buying a certain thing, or approving or participating in a
pointless war or some other mass action.
Both are efforts to reinforce or reforge social norms by appealing to
this deep instinctual nature, to all that which is invariable in all of us and
thereby makes us human.
Both media use story and image to make their point—and
to bury it in our breast (as treasure might be buried there, or a dagger). However, the main point about “noxious”
propaganda is that it would, in the end, betray those very instinctual traits
that make us most human in some way, with consequences ranging from the
everyday and banal example of the one who is persuaded to buy a product because
the images associated with it in advertisements were appealing to her, only to
find that the product brings none of the promised satisfaction; to all the ads
and campaigns in the history of Western Civilization that have contributed to
the gadget fever that has led us to the point where many of us are poised to
drown in our own (glacial) meltwater, or eke a living out of depleted soil: the
ecologist’s (and everyone else’s, in the end) waking nightmare.
One might say that both have been contaminated, each
with the other, myth with propaganda and vice-versa, so that no pure form of
either actually exists. A pure myth
would be the version existing in oral form in the context of the society that
invented it, in the language in which it was composed, not the paper-and-ink
versions to which we mostly have access now, or even the renditions given by
modern storytellers. Even if pure forms
of myth exist—unaltered by aims short on foresight and long on disaster—they
may no longer apply precisely to our present, local situation, thereby
compromising the “practical” element of myth mentioned above as necessary to
its qualifying as myth. Universal truths momentarily aside, along
this axis the question is wide open as to whether old myths can guide us in our
precarious, overcrowded global village.
Myths very often reflect the means of sustenance in a
given culture. For example, Mayan
leaders, up to and including their “death by corn”—or rather the overdependence
upon that crop—were depicted as sowers of corn, so corn it had to be even if it
meant the dissolution of that culture. Now,
our “sustenance”—our economies of grand scale with all their toxic waste
and environmental degradation—offers the very disturbing probability of an
epidemic die-off in the order of billions of people. The byproducts of the means by which we “earn
our daily bread” are precisely what threaten us. Under such circumstances, any stories or
beliefs that support the continuance of our society as we know it must be termed propaganda, and not myth.
In fact, here is a more precise working definition of
myth—that it supports a mode of sustenance that supports not only our
survival—right now the least and most of our worries—but a real-time thriving
for most all concerned. Hence, stories
that support sustainability over its opposite, cleaning up over polluting,
creating rather than degrading the fertility of the land, by my definition fit
one major requirement of myth. Stories
that reverse this proposed flow by distracting us from un-sustainability,
pollution, and degraded fertility, qualify as propaganda….Of course, propaganda
by its nature would never openly advocate for such horrors as carcinogenic
chemicals in the milk, it would simply gloss over the existing risk with some
flashy benefit, in a kind of “watch the birdie” move to distract our minds.
By their fruits we have known them: the social,
military and ecological holocausts of our time have been accompanied by the
shouts of propaganda; myth, on the whole, was what supported homo sapiens in
thriving in and supporting an intact ecosystem for the greater part of the
tenure of our species. These were tribal
people with tribal, primarily hunter-gatherer mythologies.
One could say, Ah, but those myths did not protect
those people from the more militarily powerful cultures of “civilization”,
where were guided to victory by their own myths. Tribal myths, along with their people, were in
large part effectively wiped out.
...But what if the real prize goes to the culture that
was sustainable rather then powerful in the dominating sense? What if our own culture, barely ten thousand
years old—and much younger in its present, industrial incarnation—comes to what
is in geological terms a screeching halt, whether through nuclear or other means, leaving
small bands of survivors behind to find their way? In the aftermath of the collapse of modern
economies and factory-produced goods, toward which way of life would the myths of
these people tend? Would they repeat
Budweiser commercials to each other around a campfire? No, the myth that grew out of this situation
would most likely be geared toward survival in a demanding world with fewer
resources, more need to depend on each other, and only one way to live—off the
land. They would come to resemble the
myths of tribal folk everywhere because their lifeways would resemble tribal
ways. Most probably, their campfire
narratives would include the earth and its resources within the equation of
“all that is holy”, in an effort to motivate the conservation of resources.
In other words,
it is logical to believe that any such myth would resemble those of the “conquered
peoples” whose myths, we may sniff, hadn’t been up to snuff. And that people with an eco-centric
mythology, with a desperate need to remain in balance with their immediate
surroundings, who lacked the huge machinery with which to exploit nature, would
initiate a mutual conditioning between their myth and their practices that
would only make both the former and the latter more and more “green”. Their myth would, as it became more and more adapted
to local needs and joys, become as well more and more “mythical”.
Conversely, the image-laden effort to promote
practices that would further environmental degradation in this, my
post-apocalyptic scenario, would become more and more propagandistic equal to
the amount of further nature despoiling likely to flow from it. This could be likened to advertising cigarettes
in the lung cancer ward (unfortunately, some of those doctors and nurses would
undoubtedly take the bait). More
concretely, it would be just exactly like…glorifying, in a commercial, the hard
work of Big Oil's employees coupled with the convenience and cheapness afforded
by the product itself…this in a world already starting to slow-simmer under a
blanket of man-made CO2.
I mention the "green" issue first due to
it's urgency. But other elements bring
on (or fail to) other types of balance.
For one, the masculine-feminine continuum. In a world wherein many, many men run around
never even having met their feminine side, what Jung called the anima, and the woman in their
hyperrelatedness wouldn't recognize their masculinity (their animus, said Jung) if it bit them on the
ass—which it would, sooner or later, following the law that states that repression
breeds overexpression. And because
biting a woman on the ass is just a masculine thing to do. So you need your prince and princess stories,
to represent both sides of the coin.
I believe, by the way, that embracing royalty in such
a basic way as to make them main players in our core tales is problematic for
anyone interested in long-term democracy.
Because both myth and propaganda make use of the archetypes, the former,
in the interest of universal application, might present itself as a representation
of the inner princess and prince; whereas the propaganda camp's version might
resemble more a rosy endorsement of royalty—in this case, actual monarchs
existing outside oneself—and submission to it.
Propaganda might take two possible tacks: to look at stories in this fundementalist
way, or to deemphasize one side of the gender coin at the expense of the
other. One example of the latter
strategy is the excisement of and deemphasis on feminine characters such as
Asherah, the ex-wife of Yahweh. Or they
might be demonized, as Lilith and others.
If the myths themselves contain insufficient evidence to damn or demonize,
then the religious body at large can create co-legends that establish the
desired effect—for instance, the 'history' portraying Mary Magdalene as a
redeemed prosititute.
The fluctuating practical needs of a given culture
make it difficult to say exactly how a balanced offering of myth might look at
a particular moment—perhaps it has more need of the feminine, right now?—but a
fair distrubution of masculine versus feminine emphasis would seem to be half
of each.
I intend this discussion to be thought-provoking. To be more than that, it would have to
include more concrete and specific examples of myth vs. propaganda in their
historical contexts, delineating, likewise, their perceived effects over
time. That myths, even "good" ones,
always lead us to some desirable result is far from a universal truth, for they
can be conveniently ignored. That
propaganda always tempts people to their doom is also questionable—sometimes ad
campaigns, for example, backfire and benefit competing companies, or even
contribute through their crassness to the avoidance of consumerism in favor of
a simpler and more sustainable lifestyle (and thereby to lost profits).
It also may be misleading, by way of circular
reasoning and ends justifying means, to say, "Well, it led to a good
result, so it must have been myth!" or vice-versa regarding
propaganda. No, something more mystical
and precisely less practical comes
through in a myth. They are the stuff of
dreams, which cannot (or perhaps should not) be planned or foreseen. By definition they come whirling out of our
blind spots, and so they are as difficult to pin down as, say, God.
Even so, a detailed study of " myth vs.
propaganda in their historical contexts, delineating, likewise, their perceived
effects over time" would be fascinating and perhaps life-saving, and I
hope that this article has the effect of causing me or someone else to
undertake such a study, if one (or more) hasn't already been authored. In the meantime, beware: there's a sucker
born every minute, which might be you, mindlessly absorbing commercial pap; but
also, potent, urgent myths are lying around gathering dust, or waiting
endlessly to be born, when what is needed are campfire tellings and retellings
(assuming a sustainable source of firewood, balanced off by replantings to
offset the carbon dioxide produced, and of course no broken beer bottles…..).
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